Idiotic Management Award: Equiniti

This month’s Idiotic Management Award goes to Mark Taylor, Chief Customer Officer and his firm, Equiniti. A designated share dealing and management company for many of Europe’s leading multinationals, where the simple act of trying to sell share certificates online is a horrible customer experience. Disruptors bang on the doors of Investor Relations in companies like Royal Dutch Shell, GSK, InterContinental Hotels, Sky plc, they need you!

To enter your date of birth, requires 10 seconds clicking on a clock counter, cumbersome and duplicate data entry, regular error messages when you have entered the correct details directing you to call one of their customer representatives, where you are met with “your held in a queue, we are busy” and a 10 plus minute wait if you are lucky. You are then hit with a £45 minimum charge and asked to mail in certificates on the understanding the trade will happen the next day and settlement received two to three working days later. This is 2018, not 1988.

Customers expect both speed (responsiveness) and quality (experience). Are you “shopping” the simplest of customer experiences and making it near seamless? When I call your main telephone number, am I able to quickly communicate with the most relevant individual with minimal effort? When I scour your website do I find a very clear point of contact, who I can contact immediately and if they are not available my message is answered within 90 minutes or am I asked to jump through hoops? Does it reflect a professional and contemporary service image or like Equiniti something out of the “telex” age?